Starting with rogue ninjas, building the insect kingdom.

Chapter 57 The Naoto Who Only Realized Things After the Facts

The following morning, the village convened another meeting of Jonin. This time, Elder Ziying presided over the meeting, whose main purpose was to convey Aburame Shisei's message.

Of course, the village's young leaders were not qualified to participate in such meetings, because last time, Aburame Shisei had already fainted before he came in.

In fact, just like the villagers outside, he had no idea what changes had happened in the village.

He vaguely sensed that the village was moving in a positive direction: the rebuilt houses were more sturdy, the land was more fertile, and the roads were smoother.

He didn't attribute all of this to his own efforts, but felt it was the result of everyone's hard work.

The only pity is that after he fainted during the last meeting, the elder told him that after the meeting, Colonel Sasaki left Takigakure with a group of Jonin who were unwilling to live like this in the village.

The meeting lasted all morning, with some people happy and others sad.

However, in general, everyone maintained their previous attitude, life went on, and before they knew it, it was late autumn.

The wheat in the fields has turned yellow, and many ninjas have also taken off their vests, temporarily shedding their glorious and noble identities, to harvest wheat, thresh grain, and husk in the fields.

These days, Shisei Aburame hasn't been completely idle. As his sealing techniques have become increasingly refined, he has mastered almost all the sealing techniques of Takigakure Village, and has adapted and recreated them according to his own understanding, then applied them all to the barriers of Takigakure Village.

Only now has he gained almost complete control over the village's protective barrier.

The only downside is that with the changing seasons, it is no longer appropriate for the seven-spotted scout beetle to appear in the fields and along the ridges.

Aburame Shisei can only create more scout bugs that fit the seasonal characteristics; depending on the seasonal changes, he will probably need two or three more. In fact, the core doesn't need to change; the main thing is the external form.

The underground insect nests also continued to expand.

As the earthworms continue to multiply and reproduce, the speed of underground reclamation has increased significantly, and it has now reached twenty-five layers.

The roots of the great tree that could have given birth to the water of heroes have been completely hollowed out, and the entire tree seems to be growing and floating above a huge palace.

Yu Nuzhicheng also discovered that some of the destructive insects, having fed on the sap of large trees, have begun to undergo metamorphosis in their offspring. Their bodies are gradually increasing in size and darkening in color, evolving into a form similar to a rhinoceros beetle.

As for his abilities, they are not yet clear.

Because the cost of consuming raw energy to replicate the sap of the Divine Tree was very high, he did not use a petri dish to push this evolutionary path to its extreme.

It's not that the juice can't be extracted and put into a petri dish as material, but if you want to accelerate the metamorphosis, the required material would be enough to feed at least several thousand insects for five or six years.

If so much is extracted at once, this big tree might wither and die.

Moreover, this insect was an unexpected bonus, and its function is still unknown, so there's no rush to cultivate it; we can take our time.

Currently, his main research focus is on the symbiotic parasite. Besides that, he also needs to study the two White Zetsu.

He had kept these two precious materials in his possession for a long time, and if he hadn't been afraid of wasting them, he would have already taken action.

-

Naoto's team, inside Takigakure Village.

After the autumn harvest, most of the genin in Takigakure were unemployed and stayed at home, with only a small number of chunin regrouping and starting their daily patrols of the village.

The reason lies in the orders issued from above: although there is a barrier outside the village, those barriers can only protect ordinary people and genin.

Some capable Chunin or even Jonin can still break in, and even masters of sealing techniques can sneak in silently without attracting any attention.

The village leader and the four elders have instructed that some Chunin be organized into small teams to patrol the area in order to prevent any potential problems.

The Naoto team had already disbanded and everyone was at home, but they were people who couldn't stay idle.

They often help the elderly in the village tidy up their farmhouses, rebuild roads, or teach a lesson to those ninjas who do nothing at home and only bully their wives and daughters.

Aburame Shisei also frequently sent people to follow them, but he never acted rashly; he simply monitored and observed Naoto's every move.

Half a year has passed in the blink of an eye, winter has gone and spring has come.

Aburame Shigeaki's experiments have finally made progress. First, through in-depth research on white Zeus cells, Aburame Shigeaki successfully cultivated two new types of insectoid races.

The first type is planktonic insects: they are as small as dust, can float in the air for a long time, and can also use earth-遁 (earth-遁 is a type of escaping technique) to burrow underground.

He was also the first ninja to master the ability to fly and burrow underground, so even if he encountered a ninja he couldn't defeat, he could escape underground.

The second type is the Mimicry Insect: It inherits the unique transformation ability of White Zetsu, and can not only perfectly simulate appearance and chakra fluctuations, but also briefly imitate the target's behavior and habits.

This means that all previous scout bugs can be eliminated, and the mimicry scout bugs have completely replaced their functions.

Of course, these were just extra gains. Most importantly, after sacrificing several ninjas, he finally completed the improvement of the new version of Earth Grudge Fear.

Over the past six months, Naoto has gradually become aware of the abnormalities in his body.

At first, his chakra flow became unusually smooth, followed by a noticeable increase in physical strength. During a house renovation, he even lifted a stone that would have required nearly ten strong adult ninjas to move with one hand.

He was upright and kind, but not foolish.

There were some things he couldn't understand at first, but he didn't investigate them deeply because of his trust in Aburame Shisei; but as time went on and various changes piled up, he could no longer pretend not to know.

In particular, his appetite has become increasingly intense recently, even craving food from the villagers.

This change made him feel that he was gradually turning into a monster, a monster that wanted to eat people.

Even though he eats a lot of food every day and tries his best to control his appetite, the more he eats, the stronger his appetite becomes.

In the village's only tavern, Tree and Naoto had just finished training and were about to come in to grab a bite.

The noise and chaotic atmosphere stirred up the desire in his heart, making him increasingly unable to bear it.

He lowered his head and tried to eat the meat in his hand, but found it extremely boring.

"Naoto, what's wrong?" Yuki noticed his unusual behavior, gently patted his shoulder, and stepped forward to ask.

Naoto slapped his hand away, a ferocious look on his face, but he quickly suppressed it.

"It's alright, you can go back first. I'm not feeling well today and want to be alone for a while."

"Naoto, what happened to you? You can tell us, we're friends after all."

Tree chased after him and grabbed his hand, but Naoto forcefully shook him off, grabbed his neck, and slammed him against the wall.

"Cough, cough..."

Hearing his friend cough, Naoto let go of his hand, turned around, and rushed out of the tavern.